Spudman March 2023 - 30

in Idaho
Water woes
Drought is complicating the Idaho Water Agreement,
putting senior and junior water rights holders at odds
By Bill Schaefer
CONTRIBUTING WRITER
A
ll water is not created equal in
Idaho.
There are senior water rights
and junior water rights. What is formally
called the law of prior appropriation
determines the holder of senior
water rights - a right that can be the
difference between a bountiful harvest
and bankruptcy during a drought.
The law of prior appropriation, often
referred to as " first in time, first in
right, " was adopted as law by the Idaho
Territorial Legislature in 1881 and is part
of Article XV in the Idaho Constitution.
There are wet years, there are
dry years, and then there are times
of drought. And that's where the
contentiousness between senior water
rights and junior water rights holders
has triggered recent debate. There also
is the dichotomy between surface water
and groundwater.
Surface water is comprised of water
from the reservoir storage system and
diversions from rivers and streams.
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Spudman * March 2023
Groundwater is pumped out of an
aquifer estimated to hold water
equivalent to Lake Erie - estimated to
be 392 million acre-feet.
In an attempt to bridge the troubled
waters, the Surface Water Coalition
(SWC) and the Idaho Ground Water
Appropriators (IGWA) signed an
agreement in 2015 to avoid further
litigation and a potential water call
by the Idaho Department of Water
Resources on junior water rights holders
to protect senior water rights holders.
The agreement called on the IGWA
to reduce groundwater consumption
by 240,000 acre-feet annually in an
effort to restore the reach gains at
Hagerman and American Falls, and
restore necessary flow to meet senior
water rights. Groundwater users also
agreed to not irrigate before April 1 or
after Oct. 31.
During 2021 and 2022, the
combination of low snowpack, drought
and exceptionally hot temperatures
early in the growing season and
continuing throughout the summer
resulted in depletion of storage water
and increased demand on groundwater
resources. That added up to two years
without aquifer recharge in the Eastern
Snake Plain Aquifer.
As of Feb. 5, the storage reservoirs of
the Upper Snake River Basin were at
40% of capacity.
In August 2022, when it became
apparent that IGWA was not going
to meet the 2015 agreement, concern
arose that the Idaho Department of
Water Resources (IDWR) would issue
a water curtailment to protect senior
water rights.
It's an argument that has the
attention of Idaho's executive and
legislative branches of government.
Idaho Lt. Gov. Scott Bedke, who was
Senate majority leader at the time,
helped mediate the 2015 Settlement
Agreement between the SWC and the
IGWA. In his new position as Idaho's
lieutenant governor, Bedke has been
given by Gov. Brad Little the task
of resolving disputes about the 2015
agreement that have arisen between the
SWC and IGWA during the past two
years of drought.
Spudman March 2023

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